[groundhog]

Hi everyone. New to allotmenting and on this forum.
We have a small plot in Stockport. After clearing the weeds we dug in a large pile of horse manure last autumn. A lot of which looked like sawdust to me. We have had great success with marrows, cucumbers, pumpkins, peas and beans but all our root stuff has been disappointing. Carrots very few and small, beetroot tiny, potatoes small and very slow to grow, onions failed completely. Leaks have grown eventually but are small.
Any ideas and how to improve things next year would be much appreciated.
Thanks.

[Goosegirl]

Welcome to this great forum. Mmm, greens like nitrogen but so do pots, onions and leeks so I'm not quite sure those failed. Was the manure well-rotted or fresh? Maybe your soil is lacking in potassium and/ or phosphorous so next year sprinkle a good handful of blood, fish and bone (BFB) or Gro-more where you're going to plant these and see if that helps.

[mumofstig]

Welcome to the forum!
Sawdust or wood chippings tend to take nitrogen from the soil while rotting down, but eventually give it back - so if the sawdust was the problem, the soil should be better next year. Peas and beans make their own nitrogen in their root nodules, so they're ok with the sawdust. Marrows, squash, pumpkin family usually do well on compost heaps or with fresh compost, it doesn't seem to bother them..
Root crops definitely don't like manure in their bed, in a rotation plan they like to be grown a year or 2 after the manure has been worked in.

Good luck for next year

[groundhog]

Thanks for the replies so far.
 It's starting to make sense now. Our potatoes have suffered a lot apart from being slow to grow and small. Full of holes and hollow inside. We will not plant any next year and hopefully the pests will go away!